IT LOOKS like at least one good thing has come out of the economic recession: JuicyCampus.com, a message board that became a haven for anonymously posting rude, hateful, and ignorant speech on the Internet, ceased operations on Feb. 5. According to Web site creator and CEO Matt Ivestor’s blog, the site was forced to close because “In these historically difficult economic times, online ad revenue has plummeted and venture capital funding has dissolved. JuicyCampus’ exponential growth outpaced our ability to muster the resources needed to survive this economic downturn, and as a result, we are closing down the site as of Feb. 5, 2009.”
If you’ve never heard of JuicyCampus.com, feel fortunate to count yourself among the lucky few untouched by this vicious rumor mill. For the rest of us, the Web site has been an occasional guilty pleasure, whenever boredom or curiosity about the University gossip just got too overwhelming to resist. The site was rarely filled with anything other than mean-spirited comments about a few unlucky individuals and a seemingly arbitrary and ever-changing system of fraternity and sorority rankings. Yet somehow, Ivestor wanted to defend it as a legitimate outlet for “fun, lighthearted gossip.”
“Fun, lighthearted gossip” seems paradoxical. Most of us have been the victim or the instigator — or both — of a few nasty rumors at least once in our lives, and it’s anything but fun. JuicyCampus took the game to a new level by making posting anonymous, fast, and easy. Suddenly, all it took to start a damaging rumor was a few quick keystrokes and the press of a button. Worse yet, the rumors didn’t fade the way a few malicious words eventually evaporate and become forgotten with time; a search feature made it easy to look for rumors about specific people or organizations, no matter how long ago they were started. What’s lighthearted about that?
But the most disappointing thing about JuicyCampus wasn’t the gossip; it was the attempts by Ivestor to defend the site against its detractors by redefining it as an outlet for free speech. In reality, the fight against JuicyCampus was never about censoring student opinions, it was about discouraging hatred, bigotry, and negativity.
Not surprisingly, this libelous gossip machine was controversial from its inception. Tennessee State University became the first public university to block students from accessing it via the campus’ wireless Internet network, a move which inspired the shameless Ivestor to compare TSU’s actions with the People’s Republic of China censoring Google searches. Other campuses sponsored grass roots movements to diminish the site’s popularity, such as the George Washington University’s plan to get students to spam the message board with meaningless gibberish. Ivestor responded to the TSU challenge to his Web site’s legitimacy in particular by claiming that all those who opposed him were “spitting in the faces of everyone who believes in free discourse online.”
Certainly, attacks against the site raised questions about First Amendment rights: aren’t we allowed to say whatever we wish to say, wherever and whenever we wish to say it, without being persecuted? When universities and colleges considered restricting access to the site, some wondered if banning “offensive” Internet content would be unconstitutional. Ivestor latched onto this concept, attempting to paint JuicyCampus and its users as a persecuted sect just trying to exercise their First Amementment rights. But the content of JuicyCampus wasn’t free speech; it was libel.
In the days before the Internet, knowingly publishing unsavory lies about individuals or groups was punishable under the law. Even now, the authors of outrageous National Enquirer articles have to attach their names to their work – and face lawsuits from angry celebrities. Just because it no longer takes a reputable newspaper or magazine to publish lies doesn’t mean that we should consider them “free speech.” In fact, calling posts with titles like “Fattest Girls at UVA” examples of free speech is a perversion of the entire purpose of the First Amendment. The right to free speech was created so that people could have an open and fair dialogue of rational, informed points of view, not so that a few bored college students could elucidate their opinion on which sorority got the hottest pledge class this year.
Unfortunately for Ivestor’s campaign to rebrand his site as a crusade for Internet freedom, it is possible to believe in free online discourse while still discouraging the shameless negativity of JuicyCampus.com and other Web sites like it. JuicyCampus represented the nadir of social interaction. The whole concept was cowardly and incendiary, encouraging users to post the “juiciest” (i.e., meanest and most offensive) rumors they could come up with about their fellow students by guaranteeing anonymity and allowing other anonymous users to repute or support posts. And while Ivestor is no Mother Teresa, the users of the site must accept responsibility for the hateful gossip that filled its pages. A guarantee of anonymity shouldn’t be a license to spew negative lies about our peers.
In his farewell post, Ivestor wrote to the site’s contributors: “I’d like to thank everyone who has engaged in meaningful discussion about online privacy and internet censorship.” No matter how Ivestor may want to pervert the purpose of the site, the content of JuicyCampus’ many collegiate pages was anything but a “meaningful discussion.” JuicyCampus wasn’t about free speech and privacy; it was about insecure, angry people trying to bring each other down. The world of a college kid is hard enough without having to worry about your reputation getting tarnished on the online equivalent of the bathroom stall door. I’m all about supporting free speech as it pertains to differing worldviews and relevant social perspectives, but as for JuicyCampus.com, well, I won’t be missing it.
Michelle Lamont is a Cavalier Daily Associate Editor. She can be reached at m.lamont@cavalierdaily.com.
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